The hottest design coming out of Apple is the new campus that will anchor its headquarters in Cupertino, California. Governor Jerry Brown announced that the massive Silicon Valley project is now approved for fast track. The new Foster + Partners designed headquarters, which to many appears to be a massive doughnut, spaceship or button on an iPhone or iPad, has therefore scored “streamlined treatment” as it undergoes the requisite environmental review processes. Steve Jobs had presented his idea of the new campus to the Cupertino City Council only a few months before he died last October. Jobs knew this campus would be his final legacy, not that the silly city council members really got the message as they asked him about installing free city-wide WiFi as well as opening an Apple store within Cupertino.

The project, like the company itself, will surely attract more controversy, from its claims of generating no greenhouse gas emissions to the possible effects it could have on local neighborhoods and traffic. Brilliance always attracts envy and cattiness, however, and so this innovative reuse of a vacant space could send a signal to other companies that when they build a new workspace, think as far ahead as humanly possible so that others that follow you create something even bolder and better. Read the full story on Inhabitat.